The Church Has Left the Building

              Rev. Dr. Christopher Carlson

Some actual student absences:

• My son is under the doctor’s care and should not take physical education today. Please execute him.
• Please excuse Jimmy for being. It was his father’s fault.
• Please excuse my son’s tardiness. I forgot to wake him up and I did not find him until I started making the beds.
• Sally won’t be in school a week from Friday. She has to attend a funeral.

Or some insurance excuses:

• I was on my way to the doctor with rear-end trouble when my universal joint gave way, causing me to have an accident.
• I had been shopping for plants. On my way home, as I reached an intersection, a hedge sprang up, obscuring my vision.
• A pedestrian hit me and went under my car.
• The other car collided with mine without giving any warning of its intentions.
• I pulled away from the side of the road, glanced at my mother-in-law, and headed over the embankment.

The scripture today is about excuses. It’s also about invitations. This rather interesting parable that Jesus tells in the story is one that is really somewhat hard for us to understand because there is a lot of cultural things that are going on here that we don’t understand. I think you’ll see what I mean as I read it. This is from Luke 14:12-24

Then Jesus said to his host, “When you give a luncheon or dinner, do not invite your friends, your brothers or relatives, or your rich neighbors; if you do, they may invite you back and so you will be repaid. But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed. Although they cannot repay you, you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.” When one of those at the table with him heard this, he said to Jesus, “Blessed is the man who will eat at the feast in the kingdom of God.” Jesus replied: “A certain man was preparing a great banquet and invited many guests. At the time of the banquet he sent his servant to tell those who had been invited, ‘Come, for everything is now ready.’ But they all alike began to make excuses. The first said, ‘I have just bought a field, and I must go and see it. Please excuse me.’ Another said, ‘I have just bought five yoke of oxen, and I’m on my way to try them out. Please excuse me.’ Still another said, ‘I just got married, so I can’t come.’ The servant came back and reported this to his master. Then the owner of the house became angry and ordered his servant, ‘Go out quickly into the streets and alleys of the town and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind and the lame.’ ‘Sir,’ the servant said, ‘what you ordered has been done, but there is still room.’ Then the master told his servant, ‘Go out to the roads and country lanes and make them come in, so that my house will be full. I tell you, not one of those men who were invited will get a taste of my banquet.’”

In some ways, this for us is kind of an odd story. We don’t quite understand what is going on. After all, we have three examples. One man goes out to shop property; he’s going to look at some property he bought. Another man goes to look at some oxen that he has bought. And another man has gotten married. What is wrong with these things? After all, they sound a lot like life, don’t they? We’re kind of used to that. Sometimes we will make a commitment to go to a party and something comes up, something more important, and we don’t think a whole lot about making an excuse to not go. Why, in this story, does the man get so upset? You have to understand what is going on.

In those days, if a person was going to have a feast of some kind, he had to find out how many guests were going to come so he could prepare. If he had a few, they might have a chicken or a duck. If a few more, a young kid or young goat. Or if it would be a lot of people, they would have the fattened calf. Since there was no refrigeration, you had to eat it all in one day. So, actually there were two invitations given. One was whether people could come. If the person said yes, the preparations would begin. Then the second would come along…the feast is ready, come and eat and enjoy. So you see, in this story, the first invitation has already been given and has been accepted. Now comes the second. Everybody who hears the story in Jesus’ day understands what is going on. It is hard for us because we just don’t; we just send one invitation. You can see why the man is thoroughly insulted. He’s thoroughly insulted because these people have already said yes. The other problem is the nature of the refusals. You see, not only have they said no, they’ve lied. The first man says, “I’m going to go see a piece of property I bought, for the first time.” Well, in our day we are not quite as careful when we buy things. Sometimes we just buy them on faith. But my mother used to be a real estate agent and whenever she would show property, she would have them walk the land. In the Middle East, if someone bought a piece of property, they knew every rock, every bush, they even had researched the kind of profit that piece of land had made for many years. They knew the property. They had seen it. So to say that they were going to see a piece of property they just bought is just not true. He’s making an excuse. Or the second person, same kind of thing. Sometimes we buy a car, we test drive it and buy it. Then we depend on the warranty to make sure its okay or call Car-Fax or something. In those days, this guy was going out to buy five yokes of oxen. Usually when they sold these oxen, the whole party would come out and see them work. They wanted to know whether they were healthy, whether they could work as a team together. So again, to say that they are going out to see the oxen for the first time that they have already bought is crazy. It’s a lie. Or the guy who just got married. Well, again, in a small village like this you wouldn’t plan two huge events at the same time. So this person had been married quite some time. It’s really interesting in the text, he doesn’t even say he’s sorry. You ladies might be offended by this, but I’m only the messenger…it’s a certain kind of culture. In this culture, no prominent man would tell someone he couldn’t go to a party because he was dealing with a woman. The story would not work that way. So they are making excuses.

What is going on in the story at that time? Very likely, Jesus is saying that the man throwing the party is God. He has given the invitation to the children of Israel. He’s been doing that for hundreds of years actually; he made covenants with them, he made them His people, he’s given them the invitation. He’s saying to them, “Guess who is coming. My king, My Son, My Messiah. A party is going to happen and you will be getting an invitation later for the feast.” When the party comes, they aren’t ready. They don’t want to come for a variety of reasons. A lot of them didn’t like the Messiah that God had sent. They weren’t expecting someone like Jesus. In this particular case, Jesus was saying that they loved the world more than the party He was going to throw for them. So, the landowner, or God, has the invitation extended to not just the “good” Israelites. In the interaction that Jesus has with the man, he says “Blessed are they who will be at the feast of kingdom of God.” All the folks who were good folks expected to be there, they were going to be there. That was kind of a greeting; “Blessed are they who will eat at the kingdom of God.” Jesus tells a parable that says they may not be there. It was aimed at those folks. Then he brings in those who are the poor, the blind, and the naked; those who are the sinners but also the literal poor, blind, and naked. But then that doesn’t fill up his house so he says, “Go and bring everybody else in from the streets.” Likely this is the Gentiles who were not invited. That’s what is going on. What does that mean to us? Why does this story apply to you and to me?

Well, I think it means that we too need to accept the invitation. You might say, “Wait a minute. I’m here, aren’t I? I’m a Christian. I’ve accepted the invitation.” Well, yes, and so did the Israelites. But becoming a Christian is only part of it. God continually invites us into a deeper relationship with Him in our lives. That becomes the rub sometimes. Sometimes we are content to stay where we are. We are content to be where we are and when God invites us into a deeper relationship, we refuse because we are too busy, we’re doing something else, or we’re afraid of it. I think sometimes we are suspicious of invitations; maybe we should be. I read how in the 1960’s one of the stories on the television show “The Twilight Zone” told a story about some aliens who came down to Earth and they were friendly. They invited people to their planet and said people would be treated like kings and queens. A lot of people got on spaceships and left. There was a linguist who stole one of the books of the aliens and at first it appeared that they were who they said because the first thing he translated was the book’s title which said, “Serving Man.” But then a lot of people left and went to the planet. He translated some more and found out that the book was a cookbook. We receive all kinds of invitations everyday…television commercials, calls on the telephone from telemarketers. Everyday in the mailbox I get a stack of advertisements. I’m not saying that you don’t have to be careful. Sometimes we are suspicious. Sometimes we are afraid of the commitments. We think that if we become more committed to God, we’ll have to come to church more or we’ll be expected to write bigger check or maybe that we’ll have to give up a vacation. We think that being a Christian is boring enough and wonder whether we have to become even more boring. Actually people do think of us that way or that being committed to God is boring. It’s far from that. I think we have all these things going on. I think at heart, just like the parable, the connection there, these people were more in love with their lives in the world than they were with God and what God wanted to do for them. They were too busy. There’s nothing wrong with getting married or doing business, it’s a matter of priorities. We get involved in all kinds of things and God continues to invite us.

I read a wonderful story. The story is connected with the scripture in Revelations. We’ve all heard the verse, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If you open to me, I will come in and eat with you and fellowship with you.” Often that verse is quoted in connection with evangelism. That’s right, but the context of it is that Jesus is talking to a church, Christians. Some churches have locked Jesus out on the porch, or at least kept Him there. They accept the salvation and then tell Jesus to stay away because they want to be comfortable. This wonderful story goes like this… “A man named Arthur Gordon had a cat named Oreo. Arthur Gordon said one day that he and Oreo went through their familiar ritual at the back door. Oreo had been outside for awhile and he really wanted to come in so Gordon opened the door and waited. He said he started thinking ruefully of the Bible passage, ‘Behold I stand at the door.’ But will he come in? Gordon answers his own question…no, he won’t. He stops and lowers his head suspiciously as if I were some deadly enemy. ‘Come on Oreo,’ I say, tapping my foot impatiently. ‘Oreo, I give you food, I supply all your needs. If you do anything in return, I don’t know what it is. I’m personally inviting you into my house, so come on in.’ Oreo puts one paw across the threshold and draws back. He looks out into the yard with a remote expression and still doesn’t come into the house. ‘Oreo, I’m not going to stand here forever. If you’re not going to come in, I’m going to close this door. This is your last chance.’ Slowly, I start to close the door. Does he come in? No, he just sits there exercising his free will or something. He’ll come in when it suits him, not before. He figures I’ll be patient. So far, he’s right. God made cats. He also made people. I wonder how God feels when He stands at the door and waits and waits. I think I know.”

God wants us to accept His invitation, not just for salvation, but for a relationship. It’s only in having this deep relationship with God that we can be strong to live our lives and then turn around and do what the other theme of this passage is and that is to invite. Jesus deals with a very practical sort of thing. He’s at someone’s house eating dinner, as he often did. Notice that the man invited all his friends and family. He asks him why he invited only his friends and family. Jesus tells him to invite others. I’ve shared with you before that one of the things that attracted me to come to Faith a couple of years ago when I was looking was the fact that you had about twenty to twenty-five small groups. I want to give you kudos, that’s great. A lot of churches don’t even have that, and probably not the minority. You have many and that’s great. But there’s a danger and it’s a danger that is with everybody. Human beings are just like this; we don’t like to change. I know small groups, my doctor of ministry was on small groups. Here’s what happens: the hard part is getting people involved in them. A lot of people say that they don’t know the Bible very well or that they can’t spend two hours a week with strangers. Once you get them in, you know what happens, about the fourth or fifth meeting, they decide that they really like it. Then the hard part is getting them to stop meeting together because they grow to love each other so much. You know your twenty to twenty-five groups, some of them have been meeting for five to ten years, some even longer. That’s not a bad thing, I’m not complaining. But we need to invite others. That’s what Jesus is saying. He’s not simply teaching us a lesson to invite the poor and the blind and the lame. You see there are people all around you, dressed in suits, and who look like they have everything together who are poor and blind and lame in God’s sight because they don’t know Him very well. Friends, family, people you know... If we just invite ourselves, we are not doing what God wants us to do. We’ve made it one step but we need to go further because God is a missionary God. I wouldn’t be here if God were not a missionary God. God came after me, came after some of you, I know He did. I was born in a church, but God had to go find me. Thank God. There are people out there just like that. There are people who are just going on in their lives. We get wrapped up in the American dream. I’m an American, a chaplain in the Army, and for America. But there’s part of the Declaration of Independence that I would change. It says that we are all after “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” I would change that last bit because life is not about pursuing happiness. Thomas Jefferson, bless his heart, was not a Christian. He was a deist, he was a great guy, had a lot of Christian influence. But a deist is a person who looks at the universe basically like a wound-up clock. God winds it up, puts it over here, watches it run, and goes off and does something else. This piece right here is not Christian. It’s not that God doesn’t want you to be happy. But if you pursue happiness and make that what you want to do, you will be unhappy. That’s the paradox of life. You can’t find happiness by trying to seek it. I would probably change it to: life, liberty, and the pursuit of purpose or meaning or God. It’s only by finding God and meaning and purpose that we find happiness. But we are so wrapped up in that pursuit of happiness and it leads to all kinds of evil. People get divorced because one wants to find happiness some place. People leave their children because they have an idea that something else will make them happy. People take jobs, they move and do all sorts of things because of some nebulous view of happiness. Or they just simply go and take vacations to find happiness.

There’s nothing wrong with any of these things, but they are not what life is about. Life is about God and each other. God wants us to be a church that has left the building. I stole that from somebody else. I thought it really connects because the church is existing to go out of itself. Yes, it’s here to be a faithful family, a place of strength for you. You know, life is tough. We come back here to find strength and courage and to love each other, to help each other through it. I tell the story about a man named Wyman Coleman, he’s kind of the guru of small groups in the Protestant Church. I went to one of his training things and he confessed this. He said, “In my church in Colorado, my pastor had to come in and tell me that I was wrong.” Wyman Coleman preaches that small groups should put an empty chair out each time they meet and pray over that chair that God will bring someone else in and then God will split those groups and make new groups. “My group had been together five or ten years. My pastor had to come to me and say, ‘What’s wrong with you?’” It’s human. It’s kind of like the phenomenon of coming into church and sitting in the same chair every Sunday. Now I’m not going to tell you to get out of your seats, but maybe you should change seats from time to time just to see what it’s like. Maybe you should put your seat outside. The church needs to leave the building. So receive the invitation. We can’t give away what we don’t have. So accept God’s invitation to be closer to Him. He wants you to. He’s knocking on our doors. Then be a person who prays for someone else, who invites someone else. Let us be a church like that. That’s what God wants. He’s given us the promise that, “Lo, I will be with you always. Go therefore and make disciples baptizing them in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. And I will be with you until the end of the age.” That’s His promise. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen.